Davenport Dunn, a Man of Our Day. Volume 1. Lever Charles James

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СКАЧАТЬ Princess Labanoff,” said his Lordship, blandly bowing.

      “Not she who was suspected of having poisoned – ”

      “The same.”

      “I should like to know her. And the man, – who is that tall, dark man, with the high forehead?”

      “Glumthal, the great Frankfort millionnaire.”

      “Oh, present him, by all means. Let us have him here,” said Lady Lackington, eagerly. “What does that little man mean by smirking in that fashion, – who is he?” asked she, as Mr. O’Reilly passed and repassed before her, making some horrible grimaces that he intended to have represented as fascinations.

      “On no account, my Lord,” said Lady Lackington, as though replying to a look of entreaty from his Lordship.

      “But you ‘d really be amused,” said he, smiling. “It is about the best bit of low comedy – ”

      “I detest low comedy.”

      “The father of your fair friends, is it not?” asked Lady Grace, languidly.

      “Yes. Twining admires them vastly,” said his Lordship, half maliciously. “If I might venture – ”

      “Oh dear, no; not to me,” said Lady Grace, shuddering. “I have little tolerance for what are called characters. You may present your Hebrew friend, if you like.”

      “He’s going to dance with the Princess; and there goes Twining, with one of my beauties, I declare,” said Lord Lackington. “I say, Spicer, what is that dark lot, near the door?”

      “American trotters, my Lord; just come over.”

      “You know them, don’t you?”

      “I met them yesterday at dinner, and shall be delighted to introduce your Lordship. Indeed, they asked me if you were not the Lord that was so intimate with the Prince of Wales.”

      “How stupid! They might have known, even without the aid of a Peerage, that I was a schoolboy when the Prince was a grown man. The tall girl is good-looking; what’s her name?”

      “She’s the daughter of the Honorable Leonidas Shinbone, that’s all I know, – rather a belle at Saratoga, I fancy.”

      “Very dreadful!” sighed Lady Grace, fanning herself; “they do make such a mess of what might be very pretty toilette. You could n’t tell her, perhaps, that her front hair is dressed for the back of the head.”

      “No, sir; I never play at cards,” said Lord Lackington, stiffly, as an American gentleman offered him a pack to draw from.

      “Only a little bluff or a small party of poker,” said the stranger, “for quarter dollars, or milder, if you like it.”

      A cold bow of refusal was the reply.

      “I told you he was the Lord,” said a friend, in a drawling accent “He looks as if he ‘d ‘mow us all down like grass.’”

      Dr. Lanfranchi, the director of the establishment, here interposed, and, by a few words, induced the Americans to retire and leave the others unmolested.

      “Thank you, doctor,” said Lady Lackington, in acknowledgment; “your tact is always considerate, – always prompt.”

      “These things never happen in the season, my Lady,” said he, with a very slight foreign accentuation of the words. “It is only at times like this that people – very excellent and amiable people, doubtless – ”

      “Oh, to be sure they are,” interrupted she, impatiently; “but let us speak of something else. Is that your clairvoyant Princess yonder?”

      “Yes, my Lady; she has just revealed to us what was doing at the Crimea. She says that two of the English advanced batteries have slackened their fire for want of ammunition, and that a deserter was telling Todleben of the reason at the moment She is en rapport with her sister, who is now at Sebastopol.”

      “And are we to be supposed to credit this?” asked my Lord.

      “I can only aver that I believe it, my Lord,” said Lanfranchi, whose massive head and intensely acute features denoted very little intellectual weakness.

      “I wish you ‘d ask her why are we lingering so long in this dreary place?” sighed Lady Lackington, peevishly.

      “She answered that question yesterday, my Lady,” replied he, quietly.

      “How was that? Who asked her? What did she say?”

      “It was the Baron von Glum that asked; and her answer was, ‘Expecting a disappointment.’”

      “Very gratifying intelligence, I must say. Did you hear that, my Lord?”

      “Yes, I heard it, and I have placed it in my mind in the same category as her Crimean news.”

      “Can she inform us when we are to get away?” asked her Ladyship.

      “She mentioned to-morrow evening as the time, my Lady,” said the doctor, calmly.

      A faint laugh of derisive meaning was Lady Lackington’s only reply; and the doctor gravely remarked: “There is more in these things than we like to credit; perhaps our very sense of inferiority in presence of such prediction is a bar to our belief. We do not willingly lend ourselves to a theory which at once excludes us from the elect of prophecy.”

      “Could she tell us who’ll win the Derby?” said Spicer, joining the colloquy. But a glance from her Ladyship at once recalled him from the indiscreet familiarity.

      “Do you think she could pronounce whose is the arrival that makes such a clatter outside?” said Lord Lackington, as a tremendous chorus of whip-cracking announced the advent of something very important; and the doctor hurried off to receive the visitor. Already a large travelling-carriage, drawn by eight horses, and followed by a “fourgon” with four, had drawn up before the great entrance, and a courier, gold-banded and whiskered, and carrying a most imposingly swollen money-bag, was ringing stoutly for admittance. When Dr. Lanfranchi had exchanged a few words with the courier, he approached the window of the carriage, and, bowing courteously, proceeded to welcome the traveller.

      “Your apartments have been ready since the sixteenth, sir; and we hoped each day to have seen you arrive.”

      “Have your visitors all gone?” asked the stranger, in a low quiet tone.

      “No, sir; the fine weather has induced many to prolong their stay. We have the Princess Labanoff, Lord Lackington, the Countess Grembinski, the Duke of Terra di Monte, the Lady Grace – ”

      The traveller, however, paid little attention to the Catalogue, but with the aid of the courier on one side and his-valet on the other, slowly descended from the carriage. If he availed himself of their assistance, there was little in his appearance that seemed to warrant its necessity. He was a large, powerfully built man, something beyond the prime of life, but whose build announced considerable vigor. Slightly stooped in the shoulders, the defect seemed to add to the fixity of his look, for the head was thus thrown more forward, and the expression of the deep-set eyes, overshadowed by shaggy gray eyebrows, rendered more piercing and direct His features were massive and regular, СКАЧАТЬ